


Still Waters

by DownToTheSea



Category: Babylon 5
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Post-Canon, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-31
Updated: 2019-12-31
Packaged: 2021-02-27 07:07:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,661
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22043053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DownToTheSea/pseuds/DownToTheSea
Summary: While traveling together in the far reaches of space, Lyta learns something about G'Kar.
Relationships: Lyta Alexander/G'Kar
Comments: 4
Kudos: 14
Collections: Happy Endings Exchange 2019





	Still Waters

**Author's Note:**

  * For [janetcarter](https://archiveofourown.org/users/janetcarter/gifts).



> Written for janetcarter as part of the Amanda Tapping Discord server Happy Endings Exchange. Happy New Year, and I hope you enjoy this! <3
> 
> Many many thanks to SammyFlower for beta-ing!

Though they were nowhere near the rim, this was the furthest out they had been yet. The planet they had landed on, a blue-green jewel hanging in space, textured with plunging bodies of water and soaring mountain peaks, was mostly uninhabited by sentient beings. Or at least any sentient beings who cared to make themselves known to outsiders. There were only a few small trading posts scattered across the world, one of which Lyta was sitting in at this very moment. 

The marketplace had been set up next to a lake. By Earth standards, it was wide in diameter, and deeper than most oceans on the planet Lyta could no longer call her home. Every now and then some downright unsettling noises would sound from far beneath the water, and on one memorable occasion a massive geyser had spouted up from the center of the lake, startling her. But everyone else seemed to just blow off any and all lake-related oddities. Well, it wasn’t like Lyta wasn’t used to weird things becoming the norm.

She had found a sort of park/rest area on the edge of the market and retreated there while G’Kar finished shopping. After so many days cooped up with him and him alone on the ship, it was a struggle to adjust to the sheer mental  _ noise  _ around her. She’d tried to block it out as best she could, just to avoid getting overwhelmed, but with powers like hers it was never completely enough.

Maybe if she focused on something hard… The dark water lapping against the lakeshore only meters away from where she was sitting gave her an idea. Mentally, she reached out into the deepest reaches of the lake, tilting her head as her mind met schools of fish, alien sharks, and a variety of tentacled creatures which didn’t seem to parallel anything on Earth.

“Oh, you’re a big one, aren’t you,” she murmured as she came across a – whale? Something like that, anyway. It was hard to tell; none of these creatures had a clear visual representation of themselves in their minds. After all, they lived in the darkest underwater depths and navigated entirely by smell and sound.

It helped alleviate the mental chaos of the marketplace, to brush the mind of such a placid creature. Lyta could almost feel the water sliding past her as she swam… But then she shifted restlessly, catching something about how  _ ancient  _ it was, some tiny fragment of its memory that reminded her of –

“As I can see your gills,” G’kar said, snapping her out of her reverie, “I assume that either you are performing some feat of telepathic prowess or the air is filling with an invisible, odorless toxin that will kill me within the next few moments. I do hope it is the former.”

Her eyes flew open to see him standing in front of the bench she was sitting at, arms full of packages that he somehow managed to arrange in a neat pile. Besides the medical supplies they needed, it seemed he hadn’t been able to resist a few souvenirs. “Worried my having them visible is gonna set off an angry mob?”

“We do seem to find ourselves at the center of an inordinate amount of public brawls,” he said mildly.

“Last month had nothing to do with me, and everything to do with your inability to take grammar corrections,” Lyta shot back.

He glowered. “I will not make the mistake of writing in English again.  _ I _ before  _ e _ , hmph.”

“Ha! You admit it.”

G’Kar’s mouth opened and closed in defeat, but his eye twinkled at her.

“Got something for you,” she relented, and shoved an ink pen at him across the table. “Since you had one break the other day.” She didn’t know if it was really an equal substitute, since the other one he had brought with him all the way from Babylon 5 – she thought he had used it to write the Interstellar Alliance’s Declaration of Principles. But at least now he would have a functional one until he got the other one fixed.

But G’Kar looked delighted as he accepted it, and she got the impression he would have clapped for joy if there had been space to do so. She envied his ability to live so steadily in the moment: accepting each little joy as if it were the first and last.

He inclined his head. “Thank you, Lyta,” he said, and she discovered that she didn’t know what to say back.

“I’ve unearthed some fascinating information from the people here,” he said as they made their way back to the ship. Lyta winced as they made their way through the crowd and the surrounding thoughts became thicker and more difficult to avoid. It felt a little like wading through a heavy fog, and a little like stepping on rocks every time she put her foot down.

“Apparently, anyone who ventures up to that mountain peak – ” he nodded towards the horizon, where one was standing a little ways apart from a nearby ridge “ – meets a gruesome and untimely end. Yet no one knows how or why.”

Lyta studied him for a moment, eyebrow cocked. “...You want to go up and see what it is, don’t you.”

G’Kar grinned at her, and she sighed.

“You  _ want  _ to get us both killed?”

Earlier, she had felt something like a memory of the Vorlons in the mind of that animal. It was possible that they had been on this planet in the past, or used it for something. If that was true, it was also possible that, like the Shadows, they had left behind something that really shouldn’t be messed with. Then again, she could be mistaken. Either way, she felt a few reluctant pangs of curiosity. She cast another glance at the mountain, a silhouette against the dark greenish sky.

“I have often found that dangerous situations present some of the best opportunities to learn,” said G’Kar.

“To learn all the ways we could meet ‘a gruesome and untimely end.’ Just to be clear on that.”

“Come now, don’t – what is it you humans say? Rain on my procession?”

Her lips twitched. “Parade.”

“Yes, that. I’m sure I don’t know why you would consider such a thing so negatively,” he mused. “Rain brings life, growth. We see it as something to be celebrated.”

They passed by a screen tuned to ISN.  _ “...The Centauri government could not be reached for comment. Meanwhile, Narn continues rebuilding efforts, several years after the use of illegal mass drivers on their homeworld…” _

G’Kar stiffened and fell silent, but other than that gave no visible reaction, and it was too loud to hear any thoughts he might have had. Lyta gave him a curious look, which he eventually noticed.

“Is something the matter?” he inquired.

“No, it’s just… How do you do that?”

“Do what?” Still in that maddeningly level tone.

_ “That.”  _ They had reached the ship now, and there were fewer people around. “You know my abilities, G’Kar. I’m way past a P-12. I pick up so many thoughts and emotions from everyone all the time that… But I barely get a ripple from you. You’re so damn serene all the time.” She waved a hand behind her, indicating the lake with its still waters.  _ “How?” _

G’Kar considered her for a moment, his face a mask, though his eye burned red in the fading light. At last he put everything he was carrying down and held out his hands. “You may see for yourself if you like.”

She blinked, taken aback. “Really? You sure? ‘Cause you know, I’d try to stay out of anything personal, but I’m still gonna see a lot.”

He inclined his head again. “You have already, as you put it, seen a lot. And so have I. You have my permission.”

Gingerly, Lyta reached out and took one of his hands. With direct physical contact like this, all it took was the barest impulse on her part to reach out…

Her eyes snapped open a moment later and she jerked her hand back.

The lake had been the wrong metaphor, she saw that now. A sea, that was more fitting. Gentle, quiet on the surface, but underneath there were currents, vast roaring currents threatening to pull you in every direction at once, and just for a moment it had felt almost like looking into a mirror of her own soul –

“How?” she demanded again. “How do you go around with all – all that, inside you, and not – ”  _ Not let it devour you, drown you, make you want to lash out and scream and  _ hurt  _ the universe. Like it does me.  _ Tears pricked at her eyes.

G’Kar exhaled heavily and took her hand again. This time the gesture was meant as a comfort and not an invitation, and Lyta took it as such, keeping to her own head.

“It is difficult,” he said, and for once his eloquence was stripped away; the words were simple and bare. “Perhaps one of the most difficult things anyone can do. But it can be done, and I have rarely come across an effort more worthy.”

Shaken, Lyta dropped his hand and turned away, letting him store away everything he’d bought in the ship. Wisely, he took a lot longer to do this than strictly necessary, although not nearly long enough to process everything she had just experienced.

But one thing stood out, something that felt strange to her. It was almost… hope. He hadn’t lied and said it would be easy – quite the contrary. But with his brutal honesty came the certainty that he had told the truth about everything: that someday it might be possible for her, too.

“Will you be joining me tonight on the mountain?” he asked, sticking his head out of the hatch.

She turned back towards him, a half-smile wavering on her face. “You know what? I am a little curious.”


End file.
